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CGEXRIGHT BEPOSin 



THE ATTIC OF THE PAST 



THE 
ATTIC OF THE PAST 

AND OTHER LYRICS 



BY 

LOUIS GINSBERG 



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BOSTON 

SMALL, MAYNARD & COMPANY 

PUBLISHERS 






Ck)pyright, 1920, 

By small, MAYNARD & COMPANY 

(incoeporated) 



DEC 17 1920 
§)Ci.A605303 



L 



TO 

MY PARENTS 



For permission to reprint here a few of these 
poems, thanks are due the editors of the Nation, the 
New Republic, the New York Times, Munsey's Mag- 
azine, the Forum, Rutgers' Alumni Quarterly, the 
Philadelphia. Inquirer, Contemporary Verse, the 
Masses, the New York Evening Post, Argosy, the 
Newark Evening News, and other periodicals. 



CONTENTS 

CHAPTER PAGE 

I The Attic of the Past and Other Lyrics . 1 

II Lyrics of the City 49 

III Portraits and Sketches 65 

iV Love Songs 79 

V Other Lyrics 97 



THE ATTIC OF THE PAST 



THE ATTIC OF THE PAST 

I STUMBLED on a hidden door 
Up in the chambers of my heart; 
I had not guessed of it before, 
I flung it open with a start, — 
I flung it open to a room, 
And knew by shadows that were cast 
Upon the Htter in the gloom, 
It was the Attic of my Past. 
I saw the Chest of olden Days 
Was emptied out upon the floor; 
Letters with many a searching phrase; 
And crumpled scraps that someone tore; 
The silt of flowers of a June; 
Old ribbons, faded joys, and books; 
And broken bits of hopes were strewn 
About the corners and the nooks ; 
Moth-eaten days were smears of grime; 
The stagnant silence mouldered there. 
Musty with dreams, while dust of Time 
Was deeply drifted everywhere. 
3 



THE ATTIC OF THE PAST 

Oh, in that chamber in my soul, 
Among the shadows of that room 
Old hungers all about me stole. 
Then as I bent within the gloom, 
What laughter was it that I heard? 
What stir of footsteps entered in? 
What was the murmur, what the word, 
That made my heart a swirling din, 
That made me lean to other eyes — 
And made the sudden tears arise? 



RELIGION 

Within the temple of my heart, 
There is an altar set apart, 
Where I am but a worshipper. 
I bow me humbly in a mist 
Of holy incense, sweet as myrrh — 
The holy incense of my prayer. 
That hushes all the temple whist. 
What shreds of voices cry to me? 
What light of dreams is drifting there.'* 
What is the radiance I see? 
And what the whir of wings I hear? 
Oh, like a swift and pouring flame — 
A drenching fragrance sweeping near — 
Oh, like a surge of glory is 
The bursting splendor of a Name, 
That floods my temple's passages ! 
And when I hear and when I see 
The tempest of this harmony, 
A sudden voice upon my sight 
Breaks into swift and radiant light ! 
5 



RELIGION 

This my prayer and this my plea 
This the word I cry to Thee: 
Blind me so that I may see! — 

Beauty y vn what holy place. 
Shall I meet Thee, face to face? 



6 



IN THE NEWARK LIBRARY 

Tread softly in these magic halls, — 
This Palace of Romance ; 

For mighty monarchs of the mind 
Gaze at your every glance. 

Prophet and poet, priest and sage 

Are living here anew ; 
From alcove and from crowded stack 

They look again at you. 

And all these voices of the past 

Are murmuring again 
Their garnered wisdom of the world 

Into the ears of men. 

Here Keats is watching eagerly 
Wherever Beauty gleams ; 

Shakspere is gazing in your heart; 
And Shelley, in your dreams. 



IN THE NEWARK LIBRARY 

So enter very softly here 
This Palace of Romance ; 

For all the monarchs of the mind 
Peer at your step and glance! 



8 



APRIL TWILIGHT 

So beautiful it is, this April dusk, 
This quiet twilight after wistful rain, 

That everything is breathless, lest it stir 

The mystery that haunts this meadow lane. 

A hush is clinging to the hallowed air. 

I hear the murmur of the looms of Spring. 
I see the testament of leaf and grass; 

And glory lurk in every simple thing ! 

Until I think, within this wistful dusk, 
Within this miracle of bud and tree, 

Heaven must be a land of haunted lanes, 
Where April blossoms out eternally ! 



9 



SPRING ON THE AVENUE 

Again a sudden rumor comes 

Along the avenue; 
The merry sparrows hear it there 

And twitter it is true. 

They twitter all the secret out 

To every lad and lass — 
To all the people swarming by, 

That Spring has come to pass ! 

And yet, of all the teeming crowds, 

Has anybody spied 
Romance is tripping down the street 

With April at its side? 



10 



AT A RAILROAD STATION 

Through the grimy station gates 
Pass what destinies and fates? 
Round about these rumbling stones, 
Haunt what hollow, stifled groans 
And upon the throbbing air, 
Whose the laughter darting there? 

Now and then, a looming train, 
Breathing heavily, will drain 
And will suck the seething rush 
Of the crowds that pour and crush. 
Like a pageant, whirling on. 
Flashing now and paling wan, 
Like a oright kaleidoscope. 
Swarm how many a love and hope? 

Laborers and laughing boys ; 
Lovers eager with their joys; 
Actresses and Chinamen ; 
Aliens seeking home again ; 
11 



AT A RAILROAD STATION 

Smoking businessmen and dudes ; 

Laughing courtesans and prudes, — 

Where will end their journeys all? — ■ 

At a feast or funeral? 

What will soon enfold them back, 

Brilliant palace or a shack? 

Will a brothel or a home 

Lure and bid them cease to roam? 

As they ever ebb and flow — 
Youth and Age, the High and Low — 
Through these grimy station gates, 
Pass what destinies and fates? 



12 



IN A STREET-CAR 

I WATCH on the jolting street-car 

How rows of the people stare ; 
Though huddled together, they journey alone, 

Wrapped in a dreaming there. 

I watch and I see before me 

A shop-girl's eyes are bright; 
Perhaps she dreams of a dim-lit hall 

And a dim sweet kiss last night. 

I look at a pallid mother; 

Two weazened workers who doze; 
A jaunty sailor; a prim-lipped nun; 

A girl like a flaming rose. 

And there is a sodden drunkard; 

Two lovers who wink and nudge; 
A wan old man ; and a whistling boy ; 

And a solemn and thoughtful judge. 

Where will they end their journeys, — 
These people that dream and stare? 
13 



IN A STREET CAR 

At a bright-lit hearth ; or a merry feast ; 
Or a lonely bed of despair? 

Yet wheresoever they journey, 

All of their travelling must 
Bring them together again at last 

Back to the dreamless dust. 



U 



SPRING NIGHT 

The sighing twilight slowly ebbs away 

And now the fragrant darkness laps around 

And flows about us two. I tell you, Dear, 

All the day long your words were nightingales 

That sang within the forests of my heart. 

And all the day I saw your eyes and saw 

My brimming pools of Years. Come lean to me ; 

Give me your hands. How softly from them flows 

Tenderness on my heart ! You scarcely breathe. 

Tranquillity is dripping, drop by drop, 

Down from the taper-pale, white, glimmering 

stars. 
This rustling drift of sere and shrivelled leaves, 
That brush across the night like shaken sedge, 
Will never hush. What are the hungry eyes 
That dimly flicker in the wind-blown crying.? 
What pale, desiring hands are fluttering 
And passing in the night with wistful sighing? 
My Dear, the tales of Queens of olden times 

15 



SPRING NIGHT 

Are hovering and trembling into song 

Amid a light about jour drooping head. 

The night is si:range. I feel that generations 

Are melting and dissolving from about me. 

My heart is smouldering with memories. 

It must have been on such a night as this 

That Naisi hurried Deidre through the gloaming; 

Guenevere sighed and clung to Lancelot I 

Oh, all that host of loved ones I can see: 

Francesca, Helen, Ruth, and Juliet, 

Isolde, Semiramis, and Beatrice — 

Passionate faces, yearning through a mist, 

With warm and curd-white breasts like sleeping 

music — 
Go surging past me on the waves of darkness, 
That wash about us in the scented night 
With ebbing blossoms of the paling foam. 

Come, heap on me your burning flowers of kisses, 
Covering me, while all the pouring night 
Drenches us with its fires! 



16 



MASKS 

The people in the market, 

The people in the Square, 
They try to hide their hearts with masks, 

But I can see them bare : 

On every laughing shop-girl. 

On every laughing youth, 
I lift a corner of a mask 

To peer upon the truth. 

A lover in his anguish 

Of memories that sere 
Covers the ghosts within his heart 

Behind a mask of cheer. 

Or there a married woman 

Who hungers to be free 
Conceals her cheated heart behind 

A mask of gaiety. 
17 



MASKS 

Or here two mothers chatter, 

But who is it can guess 
What daughter's shame is cloaked behind 

A mask of happiness? 

Or there a broken father, 

Gnawed by his son's disgrace, 

Adjusts a mask of unconcern 
To cover every trace. 

Or now a debutante. 

Hiding a stifled love. 
Although she feels her soul to rust 

Laughs, as she fits her glove. 

And so they laugh and saunter, 

The people in the Square, 
Little they know behind their masks 

That I can see them bare! 



18 



NOCTURNE 

The rustling trees are growing dimmer, 
Like blowing vapor in the night ; 

And down the street, the arc-lights glimmer 
In pale and silver pools of light. 

Without a word, we two are walking; 

Far off a lonely window gleams ; 
There is no further need for talking ; 

Dimly your hair is dripping dreams. 

About you subtle fires quiver. 

The silence settles on your brows. 
The night is hushed. The winds shiver 

And darkness rustles in the boughs. 

Here in the peace from din and riot; 

The stars are foaming down the sky. 
But oh, as we are walking quiet. 

What songs are hotly trembling by.'* 



19 



NOCTURNE 

There is no need for your repljdng. 

And suddenly you turn away. 
The darkness rustles into sighing. 

And I have nothing more to say. 



20 



ROADS 

There are long white roads to the lane of Where- 
you-will 

And the orchards of cherries near the clover; 
Where the skj smiles blue on the glinting of a rill 

With the heart of a laughing, merry rover. 



There are roads through the meadows where all the 
crickets cry 

Near the buzz of bees upon their sally, 
When the mottled Moth of Day slowly flutters by 

And the Dusk is a smoke within the valley. 

There are roads that lead from the snug and 
fragrant inns 

To the hovels of wretchedness and pity. 
Where the tenements spawn their miseries and sins 

In the fret and the fever of the city. 



21 



ROADS 

But there's just one road that's the only road I take, 
For it beckons me onward clear as duty 

Past the town's loud mart and the meadow and the 
lake 
On a quest for the holy Grail of Beauty. 



22 



APRIL-SONG 

Apeil, April, laughing by, 
April, can you tell me why 
You are happy, you are gay? — 
Have you seen my love to-day ? 

April, did you ever know 
Tides of fragrant glory so 
Swift to flood the avenue ? — 
Listen, eager April, youl 

April, when I saw her last. 
All her laughter as she passed, 
Like a sudden flame in air. 
Quenched the sunlight everywhere ! 

Tell me did you ever see 
How it is that Love could be 
Sweetness poured on me like this 
Sweetness burning in a kiss ! 



23 



APRIL-SONG 

April, April, going by, 
Underneath a flame of sky, — 
April, have you seen my Sweet, 
Laughing down the laughing street? 



24t 



THE TAVERN OF MY YOUTH 

Everything I scoffed at, now I know for truth, 
Brooding in the tumble-down Tavern of my Youth; 
Love it was that entered, but left it evermore, — 
Love it was and Faith it was that scorned my door ! 

Is the weary dribble upon the windowpane 
The slow drip-dripping of the blind dark rain? 
It's nothing but a whimper, it's nothing but a sigh, 
It's nothing but a rustle as the ghosts go by ! 

Ghosts of all my old desires press about and peer. 
Ghosts of hooded memories creep and huddle near ; 
And what is it that flickers, what is it that gleams, 
Through dim room dusty with the dust of 
dreams ? 

Haunted every corner, haunted ever}^ room; 
Only broken whispers hurry through the gloom. 
Nothing but a door creaks, nothing but a sigh, 
Only startled wraiths and the ghosts go by! 

25 



THE TAVERN OF MY YOUTH 

Here where Love has feasted, everything is still ; 
Through the broken door, the wind comes chill — 
I brood upon the things, that now I know for truth, 
Thinking in the tumble-down Tavern of my 
Youth. 



26 



SUMMER AFTERNOON 

A GLORY pours into my room; 

And from mj window, I can see 
The many birds that skim and trail 

Shimmering threads of melody. 

Although it's only one o'clock, 
The little moon is in the sky, — 

A torn white petal of a rose, 

Fluttering with the wind on high! 

And where the sun is spilling gold 
The girls are going down the street, 

With laughter like a swaying flame. 
With eager hearts and eager feet ! 

O happy, laughing days of gold, 
happy, laughing sky of blue, 

A glory brims your hearts, and see ! — 
My eager heart is brimming, too ! 



27 



IN A LUMBER YARD 

Blurry and grimy the warehouses bulk, dim near 
the moonlit dock, 

Where, in the hushed and gloomy yards, huddles the 
lumber stock. 

And the grim piles of the grim boards are bulging 
everywhere : 

Florida hickory, Georgia oak, are crowding and jut- 
ting there ; 

And the hemlock and the white pine from Maine are 
heaped upon 

Cypress from Yazoo Delta and cedars from 
Oregon ! 

Who is it knows if they dream of the forests, afar 

thousands of miles? 
Or what are the furtive secrets that cling to the 

darkened piles? 
Perhaps Romances are lurking and whispering 

memories 

28 



t 



IN A LUMBER YARD 

From the old days and the dear past of the vanished 

countless trees? 
And what is the woodland gossip the timber carefully 

hoards ? 
How many summers and how many winters hide in 

the dreaming boards ? 

Perhaps they dream of the whispering woods with the 
dappled aisles of shade, 

Where, lingering by the glugging brook, drowsily 
Time strayed. 

When, sunlight was dripping and soaking down on 
the grass 

And the twitter and chirp of carolling birds beguiled 
the day to pass ! — 

And the woodland would hold up torches and flam- 
beaux high, 

As Autumn-Queen with her pageantry gorgeously 
went by! 

Or maybe they dream how the drenching rain glutted 

and pelted and dashed — 
Armies of rain that massed their ranks of regiments 

and dashed, 

29 



IN A LUMBER YARD 

With onslaught of fierce battalions and booming of 

charioteers, 
Flashing a myriad gleaming swords and slanting 

glittering spears ! — 
Then cohorts of the wild winds joined with the armies 

of rain 
To plunge and to lash and to scatter the ranks of 

the trees again ! 

Or maybe they revelled in riotous dreams of forests 

wherein they grew, 
When Summer was vividly blazoning out revelations 

of Beauty anew ! — 
Luxurious foliage tangled the plants, twining about 

each tree, 
Until the forest was flooded full -wath an ocean of 

greenery, 
That billow on billow, and wave on wave, deluging 

the mazy bowers. 
Broke into bright and wavering foam of white and 

tossing flowers ! 

But here in the grimy and blurry shacks, dim near 

the moonlit dock. 
Hushed and massed i/n the sordid yard, now huddles 

the lumber stock, 

30 



IN A LUMBER YARD 

The grim piles of the grim hoards are bulging every- 
where : 

Florida hickory, Georgia oak are dozing and sprawl- 
ing there; 

While the hemlock and the white pine from Maine 
are heaped upon 

Cypress from Yazoo Delta and cedars from Oregon! 



31 



ETCHING — AN OLD SIDE-STREET 

Along the twisting cobbled way, 
Where Time has never thought to stray, 
Ramshackle houses, gambrelled queer, 
From drooping hoods of garrets, peer. 
Their joggly stairs are worn and weak 
And querulously grunt and squeak. 
And there the loosened, tattered boards 
Of swaying fences, slat and creak. 
While here and there are leaky drains 
And cloggy pipes that often glug 
And rattle many swishing rains. 
The sidewalk overgrows with grass; 
For in this snuggled quiet street. 
There come no hurried trampling feet, 
But maybe now and then may pass 
A bent old woman with her shawl; 
Or one who hobbles with liis stick. 
All else is very quiet, save 
When here a rusty gate will click. . . . 



32 



ETCHING — AN OLD SIDE STREET 

O little street, you do not know 

The pouring traffic's ebb and flow; 

And little street, Oh not for you. 

Life of the seething avenue; 

For down your quaint and cobbled way, 

You know that Time will never stray ! . , . 

4 



33 



AS I CAME DOWN IN THE HARBOR 

As I came down in the harbor, I saw ships 
careening — 
Tall ships with taut sails, bulging slowly away ; 
And I saw long ships with their smoke-stacks leaning 
In the white scud and the white foam and the 
swift flung spray ! 

As I came down in the harbor, like far swallows 
flying, 
Delicate were the sails I saw, poised faint and dim. 
And who — Oh who will it be that will know how my 
heart went crying 
With the far ships and to far Spain to the sky's 
frail rim? 



34* 



OLD HOUSES 

The gray old houses are hooded women peering 
From sloping towsled bonnets of garrets hung 
awry; 

The gray old houses dream that they are hearing 
Voices of their children in the years gone by. 

With dim glazed eyes of windows they are staring, 
Thinking of a father v/hen broken was his pride ; 

And while they brood, they wonder where are faring 
Lovers that kissed and the girls that cried. 



What tales and Romances are dozing and are 
dreaming 

About the broken heath within the musty gloom? 
What stories of loving and quarrelling and scheming 

Huddle with their memories to crowd each room? 



35 



OLD HOUSES 

So hushed they stand, like hooded women peering, — 
These worn old houses that always dream and 
sigh; 

And like old mothers, they brood and stare at hearing 
Voices of the vanished in the years gone by! 



36 



THE COAL YARD 

The night was hushed and the street was dark ; 
Dimly came the flicker of the lone pale arc. 
And dreary from the corner, a chill wind stole, 
Huddling past the desolate yards of coal. 

But while I peered at the yards of gloom 
And saw how the heaps lay dark as doom, 
I heard a crackle and I heard a roar — 
And the black piled coal was seen no more ! — 
Suddenly I felt the night to sag, — 
And Time fell away, like a worn-out rag! 

I saw before me how the forests towered. 

How the fronds and the ferns and the creepers 

flowered ; 
I saw the jungles of gigantic grasses ; 
I saw the waving of the monstrous masses ; 
And the looping mosses and the crowding spores ! — 
I watched how the greenery leaps and pours 
Down from the branches in a rich green blaze, 

37 



THE COAL YARD 

Flooding on the tangle of the riotous maze ! 

But more than this, I could feel the heat 

Soak on the forest and simmer and beat ! 

I spied dim swamps and I spied wide lakes, 

Where hissed and threaded the huge red snakes ; 

I saw the lizard and Okapi lunge ; 

And the rearing Brontosaurus thrash and plunge! 

But while they were battling in the bellowing din, 

I heard a peal and a crash begin : 

Earthquakes weltered and convulsions tore — 

I heard Chaos dance — I heard Chaos roar — 

The deafening jungles were hurled down deep — 

Earth closed over. . . . Then in one swift sweep. 

Burying forest and beast and tree. 

Years came flooding like a wild white sea ! 

Again I stood in the hush of night 
Underneath the flicker of the lone pale light ; 
And I gazed at jungles and their fronds and ferns — 
Jungles of foliage in a heat that burns — 
Jungles with sunlight and beasts, — the whole 
Huddled and crowded into pieces of coal ! 



38 



WISDOM 

What need have I of knowledge of men? 

What need have I of crusted ancient lore? 
Of lying books that peering Graybeards pen? 

What need have I of treasures any more? 

For all my treasure is in your caress ; 

My learning and my knowledge is but this : 
My heart is wisest when your lips I press, — 

Yea, all my wisdom shrinks into your kiss ! 

I do not seek the loud acclaim of men. 
Their empty plaudits, or their tinsel prize; 

For all my peace and happiness is when 

Your smiling word unlocks my Paradise! 



39 



BLIND 

The blind old man with crooked staff 
Saw everything with inner eye ; 

He tottered down the cobbled street, 
And felt the sun and sky. 

Ahead of me, the sunset flared 
With livid and with lurid gleams, 

As burning treasure-argosies 
Sank in a sea of dreams ! 

Or then the West, a crimson Rose, 
Within a crystal jar of air, 

Was dropping all its petals down 
And slowly wilting there. 

But as I passed the blind old man, 
Although the beauty flamed for me, 

I hurried on with staring eyes, 
And did not even see! 
40 



DUST 

Dust upon my windowsill, — 
Only dust it is, and still, 
Drifting dust is where we know 
Everything will ever go. 

Every dream and every plan 
Every thing of every man — 
Every dome and pillar must 
Moulder back into the dust. 
Where are Babylon and Tyre? 
Where the temple and the spire 
Fabulous in Troy or Rome? — 
All have drifted to the loam. 
Lover and beloved, too : 
Every kiss they ever knew, 
Even every sweet caress. 
Flaming once to loveliness. 
Sleeps where every glory must 
In a drift of passing dust. 



41 



DUST 

Dust upon my sill, — who knows 
If it was a crimson rose? 
Did it blossom in the sun 
For a wanton or a nun? 
Dust, the wind is bringing in, 
Who can tell what secret sin? 
What the fever? what the pain? 
What the fire in the brain? 
What the vigil and prayer 
Carelessly is sleeping there? 

Dust upon my windowsill, — 
Only dust it is, and still, 
Drifting dust is where we know 
Everything will ever go. 



42 



OLD SHIPS 

Beside dim wharves, the battered ships are 
dreaming, — 
The worn ships, the torn ships, with many a 
draggled mast. 
The gray old ships are musing of those creaming 
Waters that weltered in the days long past ! 

Maybe they dream of how the idle ocean, 

A glittering Dragon, with rippling scales of gold. 

Would writhe and twist with sleepy crafty motion. 
Suddenly frothing where the hushed bark 
rolled. 

How still they sway and think upon the glories 

Of shimmering lagoons that lit and tranquil morn ! 

How soft they sigh, remembering the stories 
Of Africa, Bermuda, and the far Cape Horn I 

By what fierce tempests were they hurled and 
harried ? 
Or did they groan on any foamy shoal .^ 
43 



OLD SHIPS 

And what strange freight or cargoes have the}? 
carried? 
Bulging green bananas or the bins of coal? 

But now they creak and startle from their nap- 
ping,— 

These worn old ships, with many a draggled mast ; 
And while they listen to the waves lip-lapping, 

They fall to dreaming of the days long past ! 



M 



ON READING POETRY 

A CUP of sweet warm tea ; a cake or two ; 
Sunlight upon a fresh white table-cloth; 
And then with these a book of poetry, — 
Such is my chief delight. Then will I pore 
About the words and dream on many a line. 

Some words are but the mouths of wondrous caves ; 
I heave away the stones and enter in. 
Then the gates grate on their gold hinges — 
And lo, what secret grottoes are revealed! 
Around the gaping caverns, casks and chests 
Bulge with a million scintillating gems. 
That drip and quiver with their drops of light: 
Ingots of dreams and jewels of desires; 
Carbuncles, rubies, lapis lazuli; 
Doubloons-of-wisdom, amethysts-of-f ancies ; 
Topazes, moidores, opals shot with flames — 
All these are heaped like piles of smouldering 

moons ! 
And in the center of this glowing cavern, 

45 



ON READING POETRY 

The Witch-of-the-Imagination brews 

Her colored images and phantasies. 

She mumbles over rows of burnished Urns — 

The Urns and Jars of Words — and breaks their 

seals 
Whereupon curling smokes and lights of vapor, 
Like exhalations of a drifting flame, 
Spiral about and cloak the peering Genii. 
These twist about and wink for you to follow 
Further into the crypts of other vaults. 
Where Lamps of bright Enchantment — Phrases — 

glow ! 

Or else each word is but a gate or portal, 
The entrance to some wonderland of wood. 
Where Beauty and Romance have worn a path 
Along the glinting brooks of happy songs. 
That leap from mossy ledges and broad rocks. 
Hurrying through the forests of my thought! 

Or else I see the words of many a line 
Are like a row of windows open wide, 
Disclosing panoramas of the Past — 
Windows and casements opening upon 

46 



ON READING POETRY 

The gleaming vistas of the Centuries — 
Casements through which a heavenly radiance 
Streams like a rain of fine and golden fire, 
Blinding the eager soul that gazes out ! 



4T 



ENTIRETY 

Each drop of the tossing waters 
No matter how small it be, 

Mirrors the mighty ocean, 
And globes in itself the sea! 

So every heart compresses. 

Hides, like a drop of the sea, — 

Holds in itself the thundering 
Tides of humanity ! 



4*8 



LYRICS OF THE CITY 



RUINED HOUSES 

I NEVER pass a ruined house, 

But always I can hear, 
That, like an old deserted shell, 

It murmurs to my ear. 

I hear the murmur echo low 

The washing tides of strife, 
I hear the hollow thunder of 

The surging sea of Life. 

For there, what storms of passion roared? 

What raging surfs of hate? 
What swift and strong desires beat? 

What shifting winds of Fate? 

•So when I pass a ruined house, 

I think it is a shell: 
I listen and I try to guess 

All that its murmurs tell. 



51 



HOT CITY NIGHT 

The dank and sulky tenements 

Are wilting weary with the heat; 
While from the doorways, children spiU 

And clot the humid, huddled street. 
The pools of faces flood the stoops 

And dribble into every space, 
Until this packed humanity 

Seethes like a vat, in every place ! 
The sallow mothers with their babes ; 

The playing, sprawling children there; 
The flaccid moldy aged men ; 

The boys with their disheveled hair — 
This weltering humanity 

Is saturated with the heat 
That wedges into every crack, 

Pressing and beating on the street ! 
But while a hurdy-gurdy trolls, 

A sentimental tinsel tune ; 
And cars are droning down the tracks; 

And weary pallid mothers croon, 
In every eye, a flare or gleam 
Reveals the sea-shore in a dream ! 
52 



THE CITY-PARK 

A HAVEN in a stormy sea, 

A sweet oasis and a nook, 
It nestles in the noisy streets, 

A lyric in a prosy book. 

And green and mossy like a stone, 
That dozes by the river side, 

It never heeds the pour of crowds. 
Foaming along in endless tide 1 



53 



CITY-DAWN 

The weai^ Slattern-Dawn is slinking on 
Slowly along the sordid empty street; 

She huddles close her misty shawl and wan, 
And drags her listless feet. 

Drab store and ghostly office peer and stare 
With many a window like a vacant eye; 

Buildings loom darkly furtive everywhere — 
And Dawn creeps by. 

Some bulky wagon lumbers, rumbling nigh ; 

Rent is the hush by sudden blatant gong — 
Darkness is scattered — whispers stumble by — 

A trolley screaks along. 

Darkness is scattered — lo, and tides asurge — 
Tides of the faces wash the streets at length. 

Bounteously pouring forth in sweeping urge 
Their love and hope and strength! 



54 



THE SIDE-STREET 

The bye-street, the shy street, 
The street where cobbles gleam, 

Is quaint and narrow like a lane 
That drowses in a dream. 

The staid trees, the shade trees 
Are prim old maids that sway; 

They rustle laces and their gowns 
And bustle all the day. 

Yon garden wall that crumbles 
Upon the garden grass, — 

Who knows what lovers it has heard 
Whispering there and pass? 

The bye-street, the shy street 

That dozes in the shade, 
It never hears the Traffic roar. 

Nor hears the tramp of Trade ! 



65 



IN THE SUBWAY 

The car is screeching mad with speed; 

It lurches in the roar and veers ; 
Staccato thunders volley down 

And storms upon our ringing ears! 

And as it whizzes through the dark, 
It plunges through the flashing lights, 

That blaze like crowds of meteors, 
Rushing away on startled heights. 

And who can tell, in years to come. 

What speed will whirl us through the sky? 

What lights of stars our car will graze? 
What worlds will flash and flutter by? 



66 



SATURDAY NIGHT 

Down through the passionate street, an infinite glory 
is streaming, 
Touching the restless pageant with glamor and 
light; 
And a mirth is stripping its sloth and prodding it 
forth to a dreaming, 
Tugging, tugging away at its heart in the night 1 
And oh, to what hot desires does this endless pageant 
surrender? — 
This mist of eddying faces — this hungering 
throng ! 
For over it, over it all, an ineffable conquering 
splendor 
Wakes the heart, the heart of the night to song. 

There's a bleary, carroty woman that shambles 
along and grumbles; 
There are white-faced, smiling mothers forgetting 
their woe; 

57 



SATURDAY NIGHT 

There's a groggy, besotted drui>kard, who blankly 
blinks and mumbles, 
How can he know what it means, — this glamor 
and glow? 
But there past a riot of color, where flaunting win- 
dows are flaring, 
Come the adventuring youths, careless and free; 
And faces of laughing girls challenge them forth 
to a daring — 
Faces of Helen . . . sea of triumphant sea. 



58 



IN AN OLD BOOKSHOP 

The bookshop in the roaring avenue 
Was like an island in a foamy sea, 

Was like a cloister waiting for a few, 
Was like a chapel of Tranquillity. 

And from the surging of the raucous street, 
I entered in this hermitage of Peace; 

And heard the tumult of the world retreat 
And beating seas of iron clangor cease ! 

Hushed in this dim and sacred hermitage, 

I paused before the volumes stuffed with dreams. 

The tomes and missals with each musty page, 
And chronicles of quaint and olden themes. 

And once again, I saw Adventure ride; 

And there before a thousand raptured eyes. 
With pomp of chivalry and flashing pride. 

Shock in the tourney for the golden prize! 
59 



IN AN OLD BOOKSHOP 

I saw the Kingdoms passing on their biers ; 

And hosts of high Romance from every clime ; 
And lo ! I heard the steady tread of Years 

Echo along the corridors of Time! 



60 



SUMMER AFTERNOON 

The sky pours gold, raining in a shower 
Fluid sunlight down to flood each street, 

Deluging all the world in the hot noon hour, 
Till the teeming city simmers with the heat! 

Sunlight spills along the allies and the byways ; 

All the air is crowded with scents upon the breeze ; 
Sunlight inundates the busy marts and highways ; 

While pale gold light is shaken from the trees ! 

Radiant with gold are passing girlish faces — 

Radiant gold of sunlight which drenches and 
clings ! 

Streets drink brightness and blaze to flaring places ; 
And round a hurdy-gurdy, children dance rings. 



61 



IMPRESSIONS — CITY-BEAUTY 

I SEE a beauty in the sooty city 
On many blurred and rainy nights, when gold 
Washes and gurgles down the cloggy gutters ; 
And cloudy moons of globes are glimmering 
And swimming in the pools on purple pavements. 
Then streets lie twisted and tangled like 
Bedraggled rainbows with the colors spilt 
And splashed away ! 

Or yet again, often the city seems 
A gorgeous golden Dragon, sinuous, 
All coiled and shimmering in iridescence 
Of countless, colored, scintillating scales ! 

Sometimes I see the city is a Spider, 
Gigantic, million-eyed, spinning with threads, 
With golden streaming filaments and strands, 
A mazy mesh and tangle of the streets, — 
A tremulous and undulating web, 

62 



IMPRESSIONS — CITY-BEAUTY 

Spangled with clustered flecks of many lights 
For lure of many souls! 

And also, when that mighty passing torrent, 
When all that frothy torrent of the faces 
Swishes and roars away past flaring corners. 
When Life, as in a cauldron, steams and stews, 
Fretting incessantly with bubbling noise. 
When traffic pours along in swollen sluices. 
When crowding trolleys clang and gride along 
With raucous grate of wheels, and autos flit 
Like fleeing beetles with their beady eyes ! 

And in the splendor of the mighty city, 
I can forget the squalor and the pain 
Of huddled and dilapidated ghettos. 
Where dark ramshackle homes of dreariness. 
Where sordid and where sluttish tenements 
Brood like a cancer, gnawing at the city. 
Oh, there it is, where darkened Life ferments, 
That I have often seen the many tossed 
And bleary faces, wanly drifting on: 
The mothers with their sagging, baggy breasts, 
Wearily tugging dirty, squalling children ; 
There have I seen the frowsy painted women, 

63 



IMPRESSIONS — CITY-BEAUTY 

Who barter love and scrape the lees of lust ; 
And rheumy faces, evil faces, faces 
Of tragedy and sorrow and despair. 

But this I know I often can forget; 
All this I know is often blotted out 
In the great beauty of the towering city ; 
In rainy beauty when the city streets 
Are like enchantments from Aladdin's lamp; 
In all the splendor of the surging city. 
That boldly blazons on the shrinking skies 
The glory of its beauty and its might — 
That shouts and hurls its Titan hands above 
To grasp and pull aside the crowding skies 
And make a way for all its might and splendor ! 



64 



PORTRAITS AND SKETCHES 



PORTRAIT 

He made them flutter to the piano there. 

He drew the gusts of laughter from the throng; 
Flinging about his banter and his quips, 
He blithely chirped a song. 

Yet from his words, were but the sheathing torn, 
Were but the kernel crushed, without a doubt. 
Even the blindest easily might see 
Bitterness trickle out. 

But no one knew he hid a lonely grief; 

Or that his heart was like a midnight street, 
Where weeps a dripping, darkly-shuttered house, 
Which blind rains beat! 



67 



AN OLD MAN 

The tide of his desires, 

In ebbing by, 
Had left the bed of his mind 

Barren and dry. 

Lost in forgotten bye-streets 
His thoughts would go 

Knocking at dusty Inns 
Of Long Ago. 

His heart, a broken garret, 
Smudged with disease. 

Mouldered with fading and old 
Memories. 



68 



PORTRAIT OF A POET 

With shouting tumult and with raucous din. 
The city seethed about him in its strife, 

Pouring about him, in a beating storm, 
Turbulent torrents of its whirling life! 

And yet the noises of this roaring life 

Fell deaf upon his ears. He walked apart: 

A moon-lit courtyard with his dreaming heart ! — 

Amid the turmoil of the swarming street, 

A moon-lit courtyard with its moated towers. 
Where glimmered massy Castles of Romance. 

What drawbridge opened and what Knights of 
Dreams 
Filed to what quest with trumpet and with lance? 



69 



FOURTH FLOOR, BACK 

The candles gutter in the room ; 
The hungry candles lick the gloom; 
And through the open parlor door, 
The light is spilling on the floor. 
A bent old couple nod and stare; 
They do not see the candle flare; 
They do not murmur any word; 
Their eyes are dim, their eyes are blurred 
For each one feels and each one sees 
The room is stufl*ed with memories. 
But suddenly a footstep starts 
Waking the dust within their hearts. 
They dab their eyes and turn to stare 
Into the plastered corner, where 
Over the books upon the stack. 
His photograph is draped in black. 



70 



MEMORIES 

The clock upon the tawdry mantel-piece, 
Is ticking-tocking in the quiet room. 

The weary woman on the rocking chair 
Croons to her querulous baby in the gloom. 

But at the tarnished picture on the wall, 
She always gazes, swaying to and fro, — 

The picture of her husband and herself 
Before they married many years ago. 

And quavering a tune, she feels a surge, — 
A headlong rush of years come tumbling fast. 

She gazes through the picture-frame and stares 
Out through the Casement of her happy Past. 

And once again, she sees the mossy well ; 

The sun-flecked cornfield near the Russian town; 
The fragrant cherry-trees; the orchard-boughs; 
The broken bridge; the brook that straggles 
down. 

71 



MEMORIES 

Again her lover stops before the wall. 

Again the pond is hushed. The day is dim. 
Aigain her singing blood is pouring wild. 

Again she feels he crushes her to him! 

But now — the kitchen-door is banging shut. 

Her groggy husband shuffles in and peers. 
But crooning to her restless, crying child, 

She bends her head — and wipes away the 
tears. 



72 



THEIR FIRST KISS 

The gas-jet sings and shrills. Upon the couch, 
The serious student and the girl debate 
Morality, Psychology, and Freud ; 
Ibsen and Keats ; Plato and Socialism. 
Adroitly to and fro they toss ideas; 
But this discussion is a colored curtain 
Tom to the floor at one touch of their hands, — 
Rent to the floor to bare each other's hearts. 
And as her eyelids droop, she turns away. 
They do not hear the ceiling shake with stamping, 
Nor hear the raucous shouting in the street. 
But in the hush that packs into the room, 
Her breathing is a melody. Her pulse 
Is quickly beating little songs for him. 
He sees the flames that haunt her oval face 
And haunt the curving of her trembling lips. 
His eyes implore. His arms are hungering 
And as a fire flowers up in him. 
He sways to her as if to drink her sweetnees. 

73 



THEIR FIRST KISS 

He gathers her . . . and then her loveliness 
Beats on his being, surges on his heart, 
Storms on him in a sudden scorching flood — 
And Time is flaring up in their long kiss ! 



74 



BITTERNESS 

There in the brilliant parlor, 

Merriment flashes about; 
The company tosses the glittering jests 

Over the joyous shout. 

But here in her darkened bed-room, 

She cries in spasms and fits ; 
While scattered and littered over the floor,- 

His letter is torn to bits! 



75 



IN A JAPANESE TEA-SHOP 

Outside the traffic roars, 

But here in the hush, I see 
How stealthy and furtive the swarthy Jap 

Is bringing my tea. 

I think, by the mist of dreams 
Which floats in his glowing eyes, 

That his heart is far away to Japan, 
'Neath drifting skies. 

He dreams of a broken bridge 
And its yellow-lanterned nook, 

Where peonies and wistaria-blooms 
Have flecked the brook. 

Do the willows hide the spot? 

Do the fireflies still glow? 
Do the nightingales still haunt that path 

Of Long Ago? 

76 



IN A JAPANESE TEA-SHOP 

And he wonders if once again 
The night is as sweet and dim; 

And, under the Lotus-moon, if yet 
She waits for him? . . • 



rr 



LOVE SONGS 

For Naomi 



IN THE HALLWAY 

The hall is windy with the wings of dreams ; 

And as I hold you in this quiet place, 
The darkness grows a benediction hushed 

About the rapture of your lifted face. 

From what sweet lyric did you blossom out? 

From what old master's nocturne did you come? 
How long did Leonardo trace your heart ? 

How many striving songs have faltered dumb? 

A hush is brooding dimly at your lips. 

You cling to me and let me hold you long. 
You do not even murmur any word. 

Your eyes are silence and your breath is song! 

The hall is windy with the wings of dreams ; 

They brush our hearts with fire till we start. 
Your eyes are silence and your breath is song — 
And thronging flames are crying through my 
heart ! 

81 



MIDNIGHT 

Warmly covered and snuggled in bed, 
Deep in the night, I heard overhead 
Battalions charge in an endless train, 
Rank on rank, the battalions of rain. 
Galloping horsemen on galloping hoofs, 
Gallop like thunder over the roofs. 

And v/hile they swept with their gurgling laughter 
And hounds of the wind ran whimpering after, 
I turned to you there in the quiet room ; 
And the word you would say flowered to bloom 
Bright in your eyes, as I held you. Love — 
And again the horsemen clattered above. 

Thus I shall always hold you quiet, 
Warm in your love and deaf to the riot 
Of massed battalions of charging Years, 
That pass, like rain, with menacing spears; 
That gallop like horsemen on galloping hoofs — 
Gallop like thunder over the roofs ! 
82 



THE LOVER THINKS OF THE BELOVED 

You are the terraced-temple of my dreams, 

Near cloisters where the glimmering twilight fails ; 

Or a pavilion dreaming to a pool, 

Where fountains sigh to hear the nightingales. 

The dim pagoda-bells are shaking out 
Their dusky petal-notes upon the air; 

And soon the Silence flowers up to song. 
As Holiness is brooding everywhere. 

A sudden whisper smoulders throug'h the dusk. 

A stir of wings . . . and lo, I meet your gaze, 
flame-white Goddess, leaning down to me 

Over my ebbing tide of paling days ! 



83 



SONG IN AUTUMN 

The soggy road is desolate ; 

The leaves have drifted down ; 
And every gaunt and withered tree,- 

How barren and how brown ! 

And yet my heart is all ablaze, 
For bursting blossoms throng, 

Where Summer of your lasting love 
Flames on my Trees of Song. 



8^ 



TO NAOMI 

As we were pushing through the rain, 
We saw a dripping comer arc 

Flare like a torch that spluttered spray 
To splash the velvet dark. 

The black and rainy branches shook 
Clusters of star-drops in the air ; 

The pavement shimmered in the rain; 
As we were walking there. 

And down the gutters fluid gold 
Bubbled away in streaming rills; 

Along the street, the puddles shone 
Like rows of daffodils! 

We struggled closer through the rain ; 

We saw how tides of glory rolled 
About the avenues, where flared 

Whirlpools of misty gold! 
85 



TO NAOMI 

And yet, with all this beauty, Dear, 
I cannot help but think you knew 

The greater glory drenching me 
Was nothing else but you! 



se 



MY DAYS 

My days are like a heap of leaves 
When every tree in Autumn thins ; 

But underneath the yellow mound, 
A smouldering of love begins. . . , 

And as an incense spirals up 

In curling smoke to bless her name, 

Her kisses are the sparks that set 
My days to crackle into flame ! 



87 



SONG 

When I was walking home with you, 
The street was glowing everywhere; 

You shed a radiance about ; 

A glory blew around me there. 

A glory blew about my heart; 

And carelessly we laughed, until 
I made a little song for you, — 

And you were walking very still. 

I hadn't thought of it at all, 

But always when I meet you, then 

I wish that you could only know 
My heart is singing it again 1 



LOVE-SONG 

The Epochs are a flight of birds, — 

The sages mumble this; 
Although the Nations fall like leaves, 

I ask another kiss. 

The sages say that all our tears 
Are but the passing rain; 

That all the rainbows of our hopes 
Will come and go again. 

They cry that all will fade like dew: 
The shield of Fame will rust ; 

The walls of Time will topple down 
And moulder into dust. 

Oh, let them mumble all they want. 

Enough for me it is, 
If I can have your closing arms 

And have another kiss. 
89 



SONG 

You are the Spirit 
And I am the Flute ; 

So blow through my being, 
That's idle and mute ! — 

Sweep through my being 
Swiftly and bright, 

Till music emblazons 
Your beauty aright 1 



90 



WINTER 

A BARREN field in the Winter, 

When the winds dart, 
When chilly the driving snowflakes 

Bite and smart. 
Bleak with the frost of sorrow. 

Lies my heart. 

Yet in the dreary snowfall. 

Lighting the view, 
And whistling with vibrant music, 

That shrills through, 
Green are the glistening hemlocks,- 

My thoughts of you! 



91 



REMEMBRANCE 

I SAW two lovers in the park — 
And felt as if a spark was caught 

Swift from a flash of memory 

To kindle all my boughs of thought! 

Till branch on branch, and bough on bough 
Blazed with the fire leaping fast — 

Flared to the roots of all my mind, 
In conflagration of the Past! 

And in the circle of the flames, 

That ranged around like Knights of Fire, 
Again I saw you lean to me, 

O Sweetheart of my Heart's Desire ! 



92 



THE ROOM 

The other night I entered in 
My small and dingy room; 

And though I cannot tell you how, 
I felt it was abloom ! 

And then I heard a little sigh ; 

A rustle for a space; 
And suddenly I turned — to see 

My olden Sweetheart's face! 

Her lips were tremulous and dim. 

Her eyes were full of tears. 
I cried to her, " At last you come 

After these long years ? " 

I couldn't say another word; 

But as I knelt to cling, 
I found that it was all a trick ' — 

There wasn't anything ! 
93 



THE ROOM 

And now, although I fear the room, 

I linger night and day; 
I know she never comes again 

And never goes away. 



94* 



THE KEY 

I HEAR it in its troubled cry, 
I know I hear it start — 

The secret that is locked within 
A chamber of your heart ! 

I know that it has harried you 
And haunted you before ; 

But now I hear it drag its feet 
And hide behind the door. 

What ghost of memory is it? 

Or what desire sighs? 
I wonder if it is a grief 

With red and hollow eyes? 

And so I wait for you to yield 
The word that is the key : 

And it will never trouble you, 
And never trouble me. 



95 



OTHER LYRICS 



MEMORIES 

The twilight thickens. As I sit and brood, 
Returning waters of my memory, 

Flooding the creeks and inlets of my Mind, 
Wash like the swelling of a restless sea. 

I feel them foam and billow up the line. — 
But ebbing slowly back, they soon depart. 

Casting my olden dreams, like colored shells, 
Along the banks of all my sandy heart! 



99 



PASTEL 

Misty against the dark, 

Against the rainy sky, 
Lilac the arc-hght spluttered, — 

And the wind went by. 

Tip-toe in the pool 

Of violet and white, 
A slender sapling trembled, 

Shivering in the night. 

And vaguely from afar. 

Like a shadow there, 
A skein of longing bird-notes 

Drifted through the air. 

Lo, the two that passed 

Did not speak one word. 
Wistful he bent to her. She bowed. 

Only the wind stirred. 
• •••••I* 

100 



PASTEL 

Misty against the dark, 
Against the rainy sky, 

The lilac arc-light spluttered, 
And the wind went by. 



101 



THE GALLEON-MOON 

The silver-shrouded Galleon-of-the-moon, 

Freighted with Song and Love, 
Is dipping, dream-like, past the blue lagoon. 

In foam-lit seas above. 

But soon she strikes the iceberg-cloud, and lo, 

'Mid cloud-spray in the skies. 
Shuddering strangely there, she settles slow, — 

And then star-bubbles rise. 



102 



AT HEAVEN'S GATES 

{For My Mother) 

I CI.AMBERED up the blazing cliffs; 

I struggled through the storms of lights ; 
I heard the roar as space was poured 
Down from the heavenly heights 1 

And through the gust of countless leaves — 
Leaves of the Years that flurried past — 
I stumbled up the golden stairs 
And saw the Gates at last! 

I beat upon the dazzling doors ! 

I called and cried amid a whir! 
I battered at the Golden Gates, 
But none of them would stir! 

Yet as a burst of glory flamed, 
Where angels fluttered in the din, 
103 



AT HEAVEN'S GATES 

I heard a sudden whispering, 
Absolving me from sin. 

I heard a little simple word. 

My mother murmured quietly — 
And lo, I saw the Golden Gates 

Opening up for me! 



104j 



SPRING 

My heart was like a frozen pond, 
After the winter had begun; 

But now the ice of all my sloth 
Is breaking up beneath the sun. 

And at the edges of the pond, 
New violets of thought are seen ; 

While all around, I see how Spring 
Is blowing up a flame of green. 

Ajid my desires are the birds 
That circle in a happy rout, — 

I see them skimming on the pond 
And gaily twittering about ! 



105 



THE GYPSY-AUTUMN 

The Gypsy-Autumn shuffles slowly back; 

Weary and wan she seems, 
Dragging her crimson-smudged and tattered pack, 

Drab with the dust of dreams. 

Her draggled, flapping cloak is wet and worn; 

And rain drips from her hair ; 
Her tawdry petticoat shows frayed and torn, 

Besplattered everywhere ! 

Weary and wan, she shuffles down the lane. 

Heeding not anything ; 
But, haggard with some sorrow, sighs again. 

Seeking the road to Spring! 



106 



WINTER, THAT OLD CRONE 

Winter, that old crone, 

In raiment of sleet. 
Wheezes and shuffles 

Down the chilly street. 

Blue-lipped and pallid, 

And shivering there. 
She muffles up her garments 

About her snowy hair. 

Then boisterous blasts. 
Crowding in a throng. 

Like mischievous urchins, 
Come whistling along 1 

They tear at her garments ; 

They tug her snowy hair ; 
Ajid drive the crone of Winter 

Down the corner there! 
107 



ON A PICTURE OF MY PARENTS AS 
SWEETHEARTS 

Parents, gazing down at me 

From your picture wistfully, 

I can see you never knew 

What the years could bring to you. 

Mother, girlish yet so grave; 
Delicate yet strong to brave 
Blows and bludgeons of the years 
Menacing with cruel jeers, — 
Mother, I can see a smile 
Lurk about your lips the while 
You are wrapped in dreaming yet. 
Tell me, can you not forget 
How you paused within the lane 
Near your Russian town again. 
How within the haunted dusk, 
That was filled with scent of musk, — 
How you shyly bent your head 
To the word your lover said? 
108 



MY PARENTS AS SWEETHEARTS 

Father, you — I see you gaze, 
Youthful in your student days. 
Did you know the nights I know? 
Was your heart of long ago 
Like a sunlit field in Spring, 
Full of daisies blossoming? 
You are dreaming, too, I guess, 
How you heard her whisper Yes. 
Father and my Mother, too — 
Lover and beloved, you, — 
Do you see the dream you planned, 
In my heart and in my hand? 



109 



TREASURES 

Deep beneath the darkling waters of my Self, 
Dim near many a lurking and glimmering rocky shelf, 
What are all the treasured galleons I may find 
Buried in sand at the bottom of my Mind? 

The waves upon the waters are glittering and bright ; 
They eddy in the wind and foam smokes white, — 
The foam froths white and the blown spume sprays, 
But deeper — fathoms deeper — the hashed tide 
sways ! 

Fathoms in the darkness, murky in the deeps, 
Where everything is quiet and dim Time sleeps. 
Galleons and argosies with chests in the hold. 
Are freighted with nuggets and ingots of gold! 

Galleons and argosies of powers and dreams; 
Laden barques of longing, where pale light 
streams. . . . 

110 



TREASURES 

Ships of desire, hidden in the soul, 
Where no surf surges and no storms roll! 

Deep beneath the darkling waters of my Self, 
Dim near many a lurking and glimmering rocky 

shelf. 
What are all the treasured' galleons I may find 
Sunken and buried at the bottom of my Mimdf 



111 



MY LYRICS 

My lyrics are the leaning ships 
That seek a haven and a goal; 

And so they sail upon the deep 
Tides of the soul. 

Past sandy bars, past hidden reefs, 
When seas thunder and lash their sails, 

I pray that all my tossing ships 
Ride the gales. 

May winds of inspiration blow 

And bear my ships across the foam — 

Across the billows and the bars — 
And bring them home ! 



112 



AT A MASQUE BALL 

The hall was flashing with colored lights; 

The band was quavering out a tune ; 
And mazing about, the motley masques 
Whirled in a motley throng! 

Figures of Folly and figures grotesque, 

Love in white and Woe in a shawl, 
Delight and Sorrow and green-eyed Greed, 
Swayed in the festive ball ! 

And while they were dancing, each heart was a Hall, 
With masques of Joy and with masques of Dole; 
For Life, like a motley masquerade, 
Revelled in every soul! 



113 



COUNTRY-NIGHTFALL 
(During War) 

The meadows drowse ; the fields are growing dimmer ; 

And dim the fragrant ricks of gathered hay. 
Beyond, the yellow lights begin to glimmer, 

As quietly the twilight ebbs away. 

And down the road, a flock of sheep are wending; 

They straggle at the turns and slowly wind 
Dim like a file of dreamy thoughts unending 

Along the tranquil highway of the Mind. 

And all about I hear the swallows twitter ; 

The plaint of eerie whippoorwills that cry 
Locusts that rasp and shrill ; the birds that flitter ; 

And buzzing grasshoppers that zig-zag by. 

And more than this, a murmuring and thrumming — 
The myriad burr of insects in the air — 
114 



COUNTRY-NIGHTFALL 

The droning and innumerable humming 
Nibbles to bits the silence everywhere! 

The road is lone, save for a lad that rambles ; 

A villager who trudges to his home ; 
A bent old crone that slowly gathers brambles ; 

Or hand in hand, two lovers in the gloam. 

And soon the silver of the moon is slipping. 

Splashing through leaves of trees to ponds of 
white ; 

Until in roadside hollows, dripping, dripping. 
It trails a row of daisies in the night ! 

Softly, like moths, a flock of hours flutter 
About this hushed and dreamy road to town. 

And all that Beauty thought, the stars would utter, 
In raining fine and silver silence down 1 



But then the quiet snaps — peace is scattered ; 

Beauty becomes a hollow empty name: 
How many roads like this in France are shattered 

By howling rains of shrapnel and of flame? 
115 



COUNTRY-NIGHTFALL 

And oh, as all the darkness bursts, revealing 
Splinters of night, where storming Ruin stuns, 

I hear the laugh of Death above the pealing 
Thunderous cannonade of roaring guns! . . , 



115 



CHAMBERS OF IMAGINATION 

'' Th6 Imagination is the Poet's rack of anguish and also the 
chamber of his joy."— Keats. 



THE CHAMBER OP DELIGHT 

My chambers of Imagination hold 

One dream-embroidered chamber of Delight — 
One room of all the many in my mind, 

Whose casements peer upon a wondrous sight. 

For there upon the hills and fields of Song, 
Porphyry palaces and cloisters gleam; 

Vistas of visions bloom; and cities rise — 
Fabulous cities with their domes of Dream! 

And it is in this chamber of Delight, 
That rows of Hours always bring to me 

Bright-colored baskets heaped with many joys, 
Spreading them gaily out for me to see: 
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CHAMBERS OF IMAGINATION 

The colors and the scents of growing flowers ; 

The winds of dusky valleys ; sun-flecked woods 
The moon that spills in silent lakes of silver: 

The quiet stars on haunted solitudes. 

A book of poetry ; a kindly deed ; 

The happy voices in the lights of home; 
An April evening after twilight rain; 

The face of my Beloved in the gloam. 

Not only these, but countless other joys 
Are yielded me within this precious room; 

Goblets that brim with philosophic thought; 
Caskets-of-fancy, fragrant with perfume. 

And often in the niches and the nooks, 

I open up the Chests of Olden Days ; 
And then unlock the Coffers of the Past, 

Disclosing treasured trinkets to my gaze. 

And from the shelves, I take the Jars of Art ; 

I pour their golden liquid on the grime 
And sordidness of common things, till, lo. 

Their image-sparkling radiance dazzles Time! 



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CHAMBERS OF IMAGINATION 
II 

THE CHAMBER OF DESPAIR 

Nor is this room the only room I know, 

For many a time, my spirit passing there. 

Entered, to learn what anguish and what pain 
Crouched in the doleful chamber of Despair 

The room is dismal. Blackened tapestries 

Flap to the moldering walls their shredded seams ; 

The shutters rattle. The floor is strewn 

With clotted shards from broken jars of 
Dreams. ... 

Here in this chamber, have the throngs of thoughts, 
With sharply pointed lances, ringed me round ; 

Probed with their pikes; each cranny of my mind ; 
Fallen on me, and lashed me tightly bound. 

Hollow-eyed apparitions of defeat; 

And ghosts of evil deeds in foolish hours 
Have lacerated me with racking prongs ; 

And wreaked upon me their tormenting powers. 
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CHAMBERS OF IMAGINATION 

And all my dastard words, that hemmed me in, 
Have cried their accusations in my ears; 

Have whipped my conscience with a scourging lash ; 
And tortured me with firebrands and spears ! 



THE END 



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